the sisters on Maui

Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Well, another sister got transferred
in to the Samoan ward, so we are out of the tripanionship….. sorta.... We went
back to our pad and found a ton of cockroaches!!! They had taken over while we
were away. We bought a spray and a bunch of traps and spent all day cleaning
everything and killing so many bugs! At first we were totally screaming and
freaking out, but by the end of the day, I smushed one with my bare hands! So
when we were finally satisfied that the whole house was clean, we went to
sleep. In the middle of the night I found a bug crawling on my and killed it
then went back to sleep We woke up in the morning and my companion had a ton of
bites! I only had a few. She had picked up some sheets from the tabernacle
earlier that day and I don't know if they were super clean. We found more bed
bugs and had to move back to the Samoan sister’s pad. We didn't take any of our
bedding (for obvious reasons) so we slept on the couch with our towels as
blankets. It was super pathetic. The senior couples at the mission office said
they will send someone in to take care of it today. But until then, we're
missionary hobos.

All of this "homelessness"
has brought about a lot of conversation for sister Mckinney and I. We were told
by ward members of missionaries whose whole pad had to be burnt to the ground
because of bedbug infestations. So we started talking about what we would want
to take out of our pad. We decided on our scriptures, our journals, and our
study notebooks. Everything else could be replaced, or we would be okay
without. We read Matthew chapter 6. In the last few verses it says
"Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we
drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?....for your Heavenly Father knoweth
that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God,
and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you." We
loved those verses. We just have to focus on what we're supposed to be doing
here and everything else will work out.

We have been so blessed these past
few weeks to see a lot of members that
have been struggling, coming back to church. We have been teaching them, giving
service, and visiting them, and we are seeing the fruits of those efforts.
Really, people don't care how much you know until they know how much you care.
As we show these people that we love them and care about them, they are feeling
more welcome and wanted at church.

We met a lot of new people this week that are interested in learning about the church.

Also, I had my therapy session,
which was good, and helpful. The
therapist was good. He said to read over the journal entries of my blessings every
day. I’m doing much better now. The image has softened with time. In one of the
blessings that I was given it said that Heavenly Father would erase the image
from my memory.

My companion and I are getting along
great! We really love each other and are learning a lot from each other. We
just have so much fun working together.

Oh and on Sunday, we found a mouse
in the church and trapped it. Some brothers in the ward took care of it from
there.

love,

Sister Hodgson

I
asked about Transfers in her mission…only read on if you care about that….

Sunday night before transfers our
zls leave a voicemail like "the people who need to pack their bags
are.......elder such and such, sister what’s her face, elder whomever,
etc." Then on Wednesday, the people who will be affected by the transfer
drive to the transfer meeting at the tabernacle. Those from outer islands who
fly in to Oahu are there and those from Oahu, leaving to other islands are
there. Also those from Oahu transferring to somewhere else on Oahu come. If you
are staying outer island you just stay because it would cost a FORTUNE for the
church to fly all of the missionaries in and then back out.

In the meeting, they call out companionships;
you stand, hug then go and sit on your zone's bench till everyone is sorted. Then
you go out and get to work!